Youth Avoiders - Relentless (2018)

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If you have been avoiding France's Youth Avoiders you're what the french call "les incompetents" and I doubt your commitment to sparkle motion, so drink your baguettes and eat your red wines but most importantly listen to 'Relentless' before everyone else thought it was cool, it just came out today so that makes this Friday good. Youth Avoiders play faster than love rocket and write hooks catchier than a fisherman with syphilis; Think German Dean Dirg guitar jangle with the punk of Short Days and frantic structure of Piss Test.

Relentless (bandcamp)

Dairy Classics - Early Adopters (2017)

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Loud, discordant and jangly post-apunkalyptic jams marinated in reverb and soaking inside of a piss-pot. Reminds me of Spray Paint, Soupcans, and Lust For Youth and music emanating out of a garbage can. It's good stuff, so you're welcome and keep on keeping on and on and on yuh dweebs.

Early Adopters (bandcamp)

The Coltranes - White Hag (2018)

If you've been a long time follower of this blog, for some reason, you'll know I'm a big fan of The Coltranes and have probably posted up their entire discography at some point and I'll continue to do that now with White Hag... Which is set for a release in June.

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The Coltranes have definitely been changing their sound around in the direction of sloppy and fetid punk; adding on heaps of filth and sleaze and a healthy dose of noise and reverb that has them sounding a lot like The Functional Blackouts and The Daily Void with some early Rohnert Park Ceremony era.

White Hag (bandcamp)

Mahr - Antelux (2018)

Fallen Empire has been about as consistent as I can hope for any underground record label, and consistently good, at that. And Antelux is no exception; Raw and unrefined black metal with its feet planted in the ever popular cosmic affiliate. Woven throughout its meaty tracks is a whirr of atmospheric drone which add a good base coat to the barrage of grating vocals, everything unwelcoming and cold.

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I'm really impressed. And I'm smiling like a schoolgirl with no homework because this beast is something entirely fresh. Not reinventing the black metal wheel or anything, but its nuances give light to new ideas and fresh takes on a genre thats become too serious and stale for too long. The bulk of its sound is bleak and primitive but there's often flashes of something not entirely fatalistic, coming in the shape of sharp and archaic sounding ambient passages, resembling the war horns of some inhuman battle. Even in it's more plodding and unrhythmic sections Antelux does well to stay on track and remain engaging, with a desperate tone that almost hypnotizes and wears you down, until it doesn't anymore.

And as always, this beauty is a 'name your price' option on the band camp page and for the price of a coffee, hell, half the price of an Americano you can contribute a modicum to fighting the good fight.

Antelux (bandcamp)

Of Feather And Bone - Bestial Hymns of Perversion (2018)

I must be on my way to becoming a completely simpleton. I haven't been moved one way or the other by any of the new releases that have been coming out… I am sure it has more than a little to do with the fact that I have been a little preoccupied from the endless ether of music beyond listening to it at every corner I turn, but in terms of "keeping up" with the music head Joneses I have been a slack.

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Of course a record smeared in bestial death metal would have my attention though, my Troglodytic brain is placated by the simplicity of its approach; gurgling vocal belch accompanied by whirring buzzsaw guitars followed by the funeral marching band behind them. I like it, it's good.

No walls are being torn down here to be built anew with fresh ideas, not like Canada's Antediluvian did so well on 'Through The Cervix of Hawaah' or Finland's Swallowed on 'Lunaterial', both of which were debut releases and definitely among the best albums out in their respected years. They are still miles ahead of any sister sound. It was fresh and it was absolutely saturated to the marrow in malignity.

Mind you, I have only heard two tracks from 'Bestial Hymns of Perversion' so maybe when I can digest it as a whole it will punch me in the gut differently, either way it will satiate your need for bestial death metal.

Bestial Hymns of Perversion (bandcamp)